by M. N. Miller

Created on: June 10, 2008   Last Updated: June 11, 2008

It was a curse to be one of those people that had a more acute power of observation, an increased sensitivity to what went on around them. To sense what may be flowing on the undercurrent of the tone of the room was life for me. I wish I could say I surfed these waves like a champion, relishing the rush of adrenaline as the realizations became known to me like I was a surfer in the middle of the pipeline that forms on the biggest waves on Hawaii's North Shore. But I was not that good at kneeling, crouching, folding onto myself and adjusting my body ever so slightly to absorb the impact and keep my balance as the wave threatened to crash on top of me and drag me down to the dark depths catching me in the undertow. At that moment sitting on the loveseat in the living room, I was no surfer about to shoot out the end of the pipeline unscathed and triumphant with the feat. I was in peril of being forever encapsulated in the wave that had engulfed me.

So I remained sitting, unable to move, not eating the cheesecake from my dessert plate. I just sat and watched everyone around me in a muted haze. I saw their mouths moving, but the sounds coming out of them were garbled and thick as the water rushed in my ear canals. My head moved slowly from side to side as I scanned the room, looking in sadness at my extended family. I wanted to cry, but could not at that moment. I didn't want anyone to know what I felt and knew to be not only true, but with consequences that were imminent and sure. Why shatter their revelry? My gaze landed on my brother. My younger brother, so happy and content where he sat near the fireplace. Philip lifted his head from the book he just unwrapped and gave me a smile, holding it up next to his face. I knew the title, not because I could read it at that moment with my blurred eyes, but because I knew it was my gift to him that he flourished. I watched as he hastily put it to his side so that he could get to the next gift to unwrap. He still loved this holiday, as much as when he was little when he woke me up by jumping on my bed with his padded, footed-pajama feet. I settled back into the cushion of the soggy couch as the wave finally dissipated, drawn back out to sea to gather strength again, leaving me in its wake with only one clear thought strangling me like seaweed: this is the very last Christmas of its kind - things will never be the same.

Driving home I kept looking into the rear view mirror at my Father. I made him sit in back. I told him

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